Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Bird Life on Google Maps

Project FeederWatchProject FeederWatch is a winter-long survey of birds that visit feeders in backyards, nature centers, community areas, and other locales in North America. Volunteers periodically count the birds they see at their feeders from November through early April and send their counts to Project FeederWatch.

The Project FeederWatch Map Room allows users to create animated maps of the data obtained for each species of bird observed by the FeederWatch data collectors. To create a map you just need to enter the species of bird you are interested in and which years you wish to view. A Google Map is then created from the data.

The map animates through the winter months showing where the birds were observed. In this way it is possible to observe the distribution of the birds visiting feeders during the winter months.